Your initial inventory should have provided you with a list of all of the products that were on site and you needed a safety data sheet for. Some fine tuning may be needed as time goes by and you change products or add to the products you normally use.

Whether you buy an msds book or make it yourself you will need to keep it updated. We think the best way to maintain an msds book is to do it over time, regularly.

Keeping a list of what’s received, or delivered, to your workplace is the most thorough way to keep your msds book updated.

You can keep track of the products you buy using your purchase orders, recites, or invoices. Or you can keep track of what’s actually delivered to the workplace. Make a list of those items and regularly check it against your inventory list in your msds binder.

Any items you don’t find in your book should be put added right away. If your employees are working with that product, the safety data sheet for it should be included in your book.

On a regular basis you should be checking if the new 16 section safety data sheets have been made available by your supplier or manufacturer. We have found only about 6% of our msds sheets have been changed over to the new system.

Check your book regularly, keeping a list of what you’ve checked, and archive any out of date material safety data sheets or msds sheets that have been changed over to the safety data sheets.

Remember always save your old msds sheets. Litigation on long term health issues may require information only found on an old and out dated msds sheet.

If all else fails you could always buy an msds book.